Today I toured the Kennedy Space Center and felt a connection to another world famous place having to do with two earlier pioneers of the skies-Orville and Wilbur Wright.

My visit to Kitty Hawk happened a number of years ago, but I can still recall the feeling I had as I stood on the spot where years of trying finally paid off for the men. Where I was standing, their primitive plane defied gravity for fifty nine seconds traveling eight hundred and fifty two feet down the line. I marveled at the audacity of two bicycle shop owners who thought man could fly. It was Wilbur who once said “I don’t see any reason why man cannot fly.” And they did it! What an inspiration.

As I rode the bus around KSC this very day and saw equipment and rockets that lifted men and women all the way to the moon I felt the same exhilaration. I heard about the problems confronting NASA which required thinking beyond known limits. And riding around the massive center seeing oversized machines that literally crawl with million pound rockets on their back, rockets capable of attaining speeds in the thousands of miles per hour in just a few moments after lift-off, I was moved. And then seeing on-screen Imax presentations of what a landing on Mars might look like I was motivated to share my thoughts and feelings here.

The word needs to get out that the men and women of NASA are planning to send people to Mars by 2030, and after that, into deep space. They even planted possibilities in the minds of the young school children present, suggesting they might be the ones to make the trip to Mars. The video was inspiring and motivating.

What is it about people who dare to reach the skies whether literally or figuratively? Somehow or in some other way they are inspired to believe what everyone says is impossible, is actually possible. And they are the ones who move the world beyond it’s narrow thinking, arguing and fighting to see that together we can accomplish much good for this world we live in…and beyond.